I AM

 

                                                   

        

I am that grade school child under the house on a hot summer day. It’s cool under here, lying on the cold red clay where Mom told me not to go.

I am a child walking from Joyner’s Grocery. Struggling and sweating because they scolded as I was leaving,

” Don’t mash the bread.”

So, I lift it high, holding by the tie twisted tail of the plastic bag but my shoulders scream and fail, and I must keep stopping.

I am the skinny teenager with wire rim glasses and a spray of freckles confused by the girls that came back to school more like women while I blush my read haired way down the halls.

I’m the China Fleet sailor crossing the concrete bridge into sin city of neon and street vendors and Asian hookers in hot pants,

“Hey Joe … Come ‘ere, Joe”

I am a new father cradling his son, amazed that this purplish mass of flesh with huge dark eyes has survived the trauma of birth.

I am a son of God, resting each morning and each night in the divine light of meditation and prayer.

Breath, each breath coming home, home to the cool red clay under the house and they call from the car,

“Scotty, where are you? We are going to the circus and we can’t find you.”